Renato Chavez Pajares
- May 15
- 4 min read
Renato Chavez Pajares is an illustrator based in Granada, Spain. He grew up in the valleys of Cajamarca in northern Peru, trained as an architect, and moved to Spain to study illustration and comics at the University of Granada. All his work lives inside one universe he calls El Wata, a Tying of Time, where humans and nature exist in continuous cycles. The word came from a book of oral traditions from rural communities in Cajamarca. He has worked in children's literature since 2016, illustrating albums, comics and books, and his drawing is shaped by cartoon aesthetics and Japanese anime.
Q: What was your journey from working as an architect in Peru to illustrating in Granada?
A: As I approached my thirties, I felt a growing need to reconnect with the child who spent time in the countryside drawing and creating. That was when I decided to pursue drawing more seriously and gradually moved from a corporate environment toward seeing the world through shapes and colors.
Balancing both paths was not easy. On one hand, I had professional responsibilities in the office; on the other, I was learning to draw while trying to understand what I truly wanted to express as an artist. Over time, I realized that the more honest I was with myself, the clearer my path became.
At the end of 2019, I decided to pursue a Master’s degree in Illustration and Comics at the University of Granada in Spain. Learning new tools, improving my drawing, and engaging with new cultures became my main motivations.
Q: El Wata, a Tying of Time is the universe all your work lives in. When did that world first appear?
A: It emerged through a convergence of experiences. On one hand, it began as an unconscious impulse to express something deeply personal. I grew up in the valleys of Cajamarca in northern Peru, where nature was a fundamental part of my childhood.
Over time, I gathered visual references from this cultural environment: everyday objects, family photographs, and lived experiences rooted in local folklore and traditions. Later, when I moved to Spain, I brought several books on Andean culture and cosmology with the intention of developing my Master’s project around the magical folklore of my region. It was then that I came across a book titled All Times, published by the Rural Libraries Network, which gathers oral traditions from rural communities of Cajamarca. There, I encountered the word “Wata” and its relationship with time.
Q: You've worked in children's literature since 2016, illustrating albums, comics, and illustrated books. Does working for children change the way you draw?
A: Yes, definitely. My drawing has been strongly influenced by cartoon aesthetics and Japanese anime, not as a deliberate strategy, but as a natural part of how I built my visual language. These languages are universal, expressive, and dynamic, allowing me to explore narrative and character design with freedom.
Rather than working strictly for a children’s audience, I am interested in keeping the image open, where the symbolic and the intuitive can coexist. In that sense, these influences act as a bridge between accessibility and complexity. At the same time, I understand style as something in constant transformation, shaped by time, experience, and new questions.
Q: Andean traditions clearly run deep in your work. How directly are you drawing from specific sources?
A: It is a relative and highly circumstantial process. My priority is to express an idea—sometimes clear and direct, other times more diffuse and intuitive. Both approaches open paths and challenges, and not all of them fully materialize, often remaining as sketches. This openness can also be a challenge, as it makes it difficult to define a single message.
For this reason, I rely on El Wata, a Tying of Time as a conceptual framework that helps ground my ideas and structure my creative process.
My condition as a migrant and the contemporary context strongly influence my work. Themes such as nomadic identity, the environment, and migration shape the atmospheres I create. For this reason, the Stone Cat appears as a figure that embodies this movement and the ongoing search for identity.
Q: The Muleteers carry knowledge between cultures. Where did that image come from?
A: This question is closely connected to the previous one, as muleteers appear as migrant figures carrying identity along their journey within a cyclical context linked to fertility.
The image comes from a personal experience while working as an architect in the Colca Canyon, in a rugged territory where narrow paths are the only means of access between isolated communities. It is a harsh environment, yet surrounded by a powerful, vertical natural beauty.
One day, we encountered a caravan of muleteers transporting provisions and goods on their mules, navigating difficult terrain to reach the nearest village. That image left a deep impression on me: a thin line between survival and the necessity of living. The mule becomes a symbol of sustenance and exchange, carrying not only goods but also new possibilities for community life.
Q: El Wata keeps growing. Where is it taking you next?
A: I feel that El Wata is still in its early stages, as if it has just begun to take shape. At this point, my main focus is to continue producing work in order to consolidate this universe and further develop my visual language.
In that sense, the next step is to keep sharing and exhibiting this body of work, allowing the project to grow, evolve, and find new spaces for dialogue.
